The Correlation Between Phonological Awareness And Reading Ability Of Adult Chinese EFL Learners

For decades of years, the term of phonological awareness has received the attention from researchers. Most studies focused on the relationship between phonological awareness and reading, and it had been demonstrated numerous times that phonological awareness was clearly related to success in reading comprehension (e.g. Bradley & Bryant, 1983; Rieben & Perfetti, 1991). However, these studies were mainly conducted among native English young readers (e.g. Perfetti, Beck, Bell & Hughes, 1987; Wagner & Torgesen, 1987). However, the research on the correlation between phonological awareness and reading ability of adult EFL (English as a foreign language) learners is rare. Besides, the issue that which subcategory of phonological awareness is of most importance for reading has recently become the topic of intense debate and no consensus has yet been reached (see Hulme, Hatcher, Nation, Brown, Adams & Stuart, 2002). This study attempted to clarify the relative importance of onset-rime versus phoneme awareness as predictors of reading skill in adult readers.The present study addressed the following three questions: (1) Do adult Chinese EFL learners use bottom-up strategies during reading? (2) Is there a correlation between phonological awareness and reading ability of adult Chinese EFL learners? If so, (3) Which sub-category of phonological awareness, onset-rime awareness or phoneme awareness plays a greater predictive role in the reading of adult Chinese EFL learners? This study involved 54 freshmen college students majoring in software engineering, lasted for 9 days and went through two stages. The first stage included the questionnaire survey to investigate whether the participants employed bottom-up strategies in their reading. Then the face-to-face interview was conducted as assistant to further some questions concerning phonological awareness. Based on Stanovich's (1986) Phonological Deficit Hypothesis, the second stage was concerned with the core issue of the present study, i.e. the correlation between phonological awareness and reading ability. The results revealed that (1) Adult Chinese learners use bottom-up strategies during reading. (2) There is significant correlation between phonological awareness and reading ability of adult Chinese EFL learners. (3) Phoneme awareness plays a greater predictive role in the reading of adult Chinese EFL learners than onset-rime awareness. The third finding is consistent with the results of the research by Hulme et al (2002) that phoneme awareness is a better predictor of reading than onset-rime awareness. The second finding that there is significant correlation between phonological awareness and reading not only confirmed the previous studies which claimed the important role that phonological awareness played in reading development, but also blazed a new trail in the field of the research concerning the correlation between phonological awareness and reading in adult EFL learners. Besides, it provided a new method of identifying adult readers at risk of reading problems and called up the attention of both teachers and students about the important role that phonological skills play in reading.